


Achieving Flight

by the_technicolor_whiscash



Category: The Greatest Showman (2017)
Genre: F/M, Falling In Love, Fluff, Pre-Relationship, Romance, Trapeze, Trapeze flying, static trapeze, there are different types of trapeze fun fact
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-12
Updated: 2018-04-12
Packaged: 2019-04-21 20:04:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,685
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14292402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_technicolor_whiscash/pseuds/the_technicolor_whiscash
Summary: Long before they were ever in a relationship, Anne convinced Phillip to try the trapeze with her. He finds it to be freeing.





	Achieving Flight

**Author's Note:**

> Fun fact all I know about trapeze comes from google. Though I actually did once try aerial silks which are pretty cool. So if I get any of the trapeze stuff horribly wrong, blame my complete lack of knowledge.

Phillip remembered the first time he ever flew up on the trapeze. Anne had convinced him to, long before they began their delicate dance around a relationship. But even then, he still felt weightless whenever he saw her. 

At first, he opposed trying it. He was too heavy, or not strong enough to hold on. But W.D. was clearly not too heavy, and he was far bigger than Phillip, and he had seen Barnum’s daughters fly, albeit close to the ground, and they were still children. So his only real excuse was fear. He didn’t fear heights, but he more feared breaking something in a fall. 

Anne, however, refused to accept that, and eventually he found himself gripping a long, wide rope, and hoping to god that it wouldn’t fly into the air too fast. 

“Ready?” Anne said, far too excited for anyone’s own good. 

Phillip took a deep breath, gripping the rope tighter. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”

“Hold on!” 

And with that, the rope went zipping upwards, Phillip along with it. He clung to it for dear life, coming to a stop a good distance in the air. Twisting his legs around the rope for further grip, he yelled down to Anne, “Can I get down now?”

“No. You’re not coming down until we get over your fear of heights.” She zoomed after him into the air, on that simple yet majestic metal hoop of hers. Anne always looked so graceful, so magnificent, like a flower blown on the wind. Exactly the opposite of how Phillip assumed he looked at that moment. 

“Ha. Right. Remind me who pays your salary again?”

“P.T.”

“Of course.” He looked back down at the ground and gulped. “I shouldn’t have let you talk me into this.”

“Don’t worry. I won’t let you fall.”

Normally, he would have laughed or made a joke. But the way she said it sounded so sincere, he trusted wholeheartedly that if he did fall, she would be right there to catch him. 

Phillip watched as Anne swung from the hoop to the trapeze bar, and from there hooking her legs around the bar and hanging upside-down. 

“You’re sure this is safe?” 

Anne just gave him a look. 

“Alright, stupid question.”

“Very. Of course it’s not safe. But you just have to trust yourself and your partner. That’s the thing about trapeze, it’s an act that requires a lot of trust.”

“Do you trust me not to fall and break everything?”

She smiled. “I’m hoping, at this point. Not quite at the point of trust yet. What about you, do you trust me?”

“Yes.” The word slipped out almost as soon as she had finished speaking. Phillip felt color rise into his cheeks, and he turned his head away. However, that slight movement caused the rope to turn. Surprised by the motion, he slid down an inch or two on the rope. 

“Oh, boy. I’m definitely not at the point of trust yet.” Anne sighed. “Lesson one, how to not fall down the rope.”

“Please teach me how to do that.”

“Step one, wrap the rope around one of your feet.”

Phillip tried to spin the rope around his foot, but he could tell he was doing something wrong. 

“Do it kind of more like a knot around your foot, so it feels like you’re almost standing on the rope.”

After several more tries and a significant amount of flailing like a fish, Phillip managed to get the rope sufficiently tied around his foot. That stopped the slipping, but he was still a good 20, 30 feet in the air. 

“Now we’re getting somewhere.”

“Good. Can I get down now?”

“Nope. We’ve still got work to do. I want you to swing over and grab the hoop.”

Phillip felt his heart drop into his stomach. “Swing? And grab that?”

“You’re already secure in the rope. Just push back and forth, and eventually, you’ll get enough momentum to be able to reach over there and grab it.”

“I… I can’t.” 

“Yes, you can. I believe in you.”

He took a deep breath. If Anne could do it, so could he. Hesitantly, he shifted back, then forewords, swinging the rope slightly. 

“Good, just like that, except put a lot more force behind it.”

He swung again, gaining more momentum. 

“There we go! Getting past the baby swings.”

His heart was racing as he finally managed to reach out with one hand and grab ahold of the hoop. His momentum came to a stop, and he was stuck in midair, one hand clinging to the hoop and the rest of his body wrapped around the rope. 

“Excellent! Now, I want you to move from the rope to the hoop.”

“Oh, now, that’s impossible, right? That’s just a joke, and I can actually just get down right now and go home?”

“It’s neither of those things, and no, you are not going home. Bring your foot over the inside of the hoop, then unhook your other foot, bring your other hand over, and your other foot will come with the rest of your body.”

“Oh, god.” Phillip almost felt nauseous at the thought. But he knew that if he didn’t do it, she would probably just leave him hanging up in the air until he found a way down himself. And so he did as she said, and now he was sitting on the inside of the hoop, hands clinging to the cold metal. 

Anne, still upside-down, clapped. “Very good! Got that one down in one try. See, you’re getting better at it, and it only gets more natural as you go along.”

The hoop slowly spun around, with Anne’s face coming into view every few seconds. This was constant motion, one that Phillip was not expecting. “Wow, this is really uncomfortable.”

“I’m used to it by now.” Nimbly, she swung her body up, and was now sitting atop the bar. “This next one will be our last trick for the day.”

“Thank god.”

Though he felt terrified, and would never admit it to Anne, he was actually starting to enjoy the trapeze. It was a certain freedom, to be spinning around stories above the ground, nearly flying. No, this was flying, or as close as Phillip would ever get to it. He focused for a moment on the feeling of his legs, and how there was no floor for a significant distance below him. The feeling he got in the pit of his stomach was something akin to the way he felt when he looked at Anne. Thrilling, yet terrifying. The idea that freedom was so close, yet so was falling. 

“For this trick, I’m going to swing over there, grab you by the hands, and swing you on to that balcony.”

Phillip’s jaw dropped. “That… that’s…”

“You said that you trust I’m not going to drop you. You just need to hold on, and let go when I tell you to. It’s either that, or sit in the hoop for the rest of the night while I go home.”

He closed his eyes, taking a deep breath and settling the intense fear growing in his stomach. “Alright. Let’s do this.” 

“When I swing up to you and reach out, you’re going to grab my hands. When we swing towards the balcony, you let go. It’s easy.” She returned to her position upside-down, hanging by her legs. “Ready?”

“I don’t really have a choice.”

Anne managed to gain momentum significantly faster than he could, and within a second she was reaching out. Phillip grabbed onto each of her hands, feeling the hoop sliding out from beneath him, and the only things holding him up were her hands and a sliver of hope that all this would be over soon. 

And it was. Phillip soon found himself standing, slightly startled, on the balcony, breathing much harder than he had been initially. But instead of feeling like he had nothing but fear pent up, there was something more positive festering in his stomach. He felt absolutely, positively happy, thrilled by the concept that he had, in fact, just successfully done the trapeze. 

“Told ya you could trust me.” Anne said from behind him, and he whipped around to see her standing on the balcony with him. 

“Wait, weren’t you just hanging upside-down by your legs?”

“I’m very good at what I do, Phillip.” She smiled. “And you’re not bad. For a beginner.”

That color returned into Phillip’s cheeks, but luckily, it was darker in the balcony. Hopefully she wouldn’t be able to see just how flattered he was by her. “Thanks. Just, please don’t make me do that again.”

“Don’t worry, I won’t. Not unless you want to.”

He was about to deny it, but then realized that he may very well want to try it again. It was fun, once you get past the initial terror. “Maybe some other time. My arms are killing me now.”

“That’s the one negative. You’ve gotta build up a lot of upper arm strength to be good at this job.”

“I’m sure.” 

“Well, you’re free to go now. I won’t keep you trapped in here forever.”

Phillip smiled. “Thanks. Though I’m not sure I would mind it too much. Not if you were here with me.” He realized how corny that sounded, and immediately tried to come up with a way to cover it up. “Teaching me trapeze, I mean.”

Something struck Anne’s expression, a kind of sadness that caused her to avert her eyes. Something that said she had been hurt before, in a situation not too different from this one. “Just trapeze?”

“Y–yeah. Just trapeze. If that’s what you want.”

“Just trapeze, then.” She glanced back up at his face. “Goodnight, Phillip.”

Phillip saw that the situation was quickly deteriorating, and he couldn’t save it. Now simply wasn’t the time for him to tell her his affections. There was something within her, something holding her back, even when she was at her freest. “Goodnight, Anne. Sleep well.”

“You too.” 

And with that, she was gone.

**Author's Note:**

> First Greatest Showman fic in a while, woo woo!


End file.
